Protesters appeal ban on rally at convention
NEW YORK -- An antiwar group yesterday appealed an official ban on a rally in New York's Central Park to protest President Bush's policies the day before the Republican National Convention in August.
Last month the city parks department, citing potential damage to the grass, denied United for Peace and Justice a permit to have a projected crowd of 250,000 march on Aug. 29 to a demonstration on a meadow known as the Great Lawn. The site is more than 2 miles from the convention arena.
The unprecedented ban is one of several issues of free speech, security, and politics that the heavily Democratic city is grappling with before the Aug. 30-Sept. 2 convention to nominate Bush for a second four-year term.
''It's a sharp break from tradition in New York," said attorney Chris Dunn of the New York Civil Liberties Union. ''There have been political events in Central Park for decades. It is the obvious place to put it."
United for Peace and Justice, a coalition of left-wing groups, filed its appeal with the parks department yesterday and said it would go to court if it is again denied.
Megan Sheekey, a parks spokeswoman, said the appeal would be considered, but she added, ''The Great Lawn cannot accommodate a quarter of a million people." She said an event that size had not been allowed since 1997 after the lawn was rebuilt.
Even the New York Post, a tabloid that is unabashedly pro-Bush and supports his policies in going to war in Iraq, complained about the ban. '' 'Keep Off The Grass' appears nowhere in the First Amendment," the newspaper said in an April 30 editorial.
The 3-mile march before the rally would take anti-Bush protesters past the Madison Square Garden convention venue, but police have not yet agreed to issue a permit for the proposed route.
Protest organizer Leslie Cagan acknowledged there are ''legitimate security concerns," but she urged authorities not to deny free speech and assembly rights. 